Changing
by Shadowed Twilight
Summary: Willow muses on her life, starting with Buffy and ending with when she tried to end the world.


Changing

By Shadowed Twilight

Author's Note: I changed my name. I used to be Astra Angel, and now I'm Shadowed Twilight... ^-^ I now this sucks, and is really bad *shrugs* but I like it enough.

Feedback: I'd be grateful if you would be considerate enough to give me a review!

Distribution: Always welcome

***

I am Willow Rosenberg.

And I'm going to hell. 

Ever since six years ago, ever since I met Buffy, ever since I knew that the things under my bed and from the dark were true.

Not that I blame Buffy, of course. I blame me.

I used to be Willow the Nerd, with fuzzy sweaters and kid clothes. My red hair was long, used to cover my face. I was shy, no one liked me, a smart, computer nerd with only my best friends, Jesse and Xander. My parents never noticed me; Cordelia Chase always put me down; and I only dreamed of being with Xander.

Then I could stake vampires! A petite blond girl, Buffy, decided to be friendly with me, and that's when I found out that she was the Slayer. That's right, vampires. Creatures of the night. At least I was some help to someone, including Giles, her Watcher. 

Then I became immersed into magick. Fascinating, it was. I mean, it's amazing- I could have supernatural powers that had been only fabled. I grew confident in myself, cutting my hair so it reached my shoulders, loving my boyfriend, Oz. I remember when he had courageously taken a bullet for me.

Then the fluke happened. I believe that was the first mistake of my carefully, semi-structured life... I had kissed Xander, and he had kissed me, in my room when we were trying on clothes for the Homecoming Dance. It happened again, and we were caught, in that abandoned factory Spike locked us up in. 

The look on Oz and Cordy's face...

Oz wouldn't talk to me, and I was miserable. We made up, and when the Mayor was about to take over Sunnydale, I lost my virginity to him. My first time. It was incredible. 

Then we went on to college. To UC Sunnydale. There... Oz met Veruca. The blond bitch was literally one, a werewolf too. After Oz left, God, how depressed I was. I had depended so much on Oz, my first, that it was like ripping away more than half myself when he left.

Tara.

My beautiful blond witch... I met her at a Wiccan coven. By that time, my magick had grown, and I wanted to share it with people. Unfortunately, the only one who actually could do magick. It wasn't that long before we fell in love. Oz came back, but I chose Tara.

When Glory left Tara brain-dead, I was furious beyond anything. I tried killing her, but that didn't help.

Buffy had died to save her sister. So I came up with the plan to bring her back, to bring our Buffy back from the hell dimension that she was stuck in. 

That spell was incredibly hard. I regurgitated a live snake, stood many slashes on my arms, courtesy of Osiris. But I did. I brought Buffy back.

I felt so much pain when Buffy admitted that when I brought her back, I had ripped her out of heaven. I was in shock, horror. I had been so proud of myself for being able to do it... plus I was trouble with Tara because she had thought that I was abusing magick. So I did a memory spell on her. 

She left me, to give up magick, and it was so hard. Everything was just so damned slow. But I did it.

Tara came to me!

We made love, and did it again. It was a beautiful morning, just beautiful.

Then she died. 

Warren killed her, with one bullet. 

An accident, as he tried to kill Buffy.

I was blinded, with passionate fury that I had never felt before in my twenty-one years. I went to the Magic Box, drained the books of all of its black majick, and headed out to destroy Warren, and his partners, Jonathan and Andrew.

Buffy and everyone tried to stop me, of course. But it was like I wasn't in control of my body- the majick was deeply rooted in me, turning my hair and my eyes into a demonic black, and giving me black veins that decorated my face.

I had succeeded in killing Warren, but not without torturing him first. Driving the very bullet that was in Buffy's body into him, I finally, majickally stripped the skin off his body as Buffy and everyone arrived.

The magick I had taken from Giles unlocked the humanity my dark majick hid from me, and I was so unbelievably sad, I tried to end the world, to destroy it forever.

Who would have thought, my best friend, the one who grew up besides me, would have stopped me?

Xander, despite desperate majick scratches, had stopped me. Three words halted me.

"I love you."

I cried in his arms as my hair turned red again. I cried for Tara, I cried for me, I cried in shame, and I cried for all of the innocent people I would have destroyed if I had succeeded.

Hell. That's where I'm going.

And as I stand in front of the mirror in Tara and my old room, I hardly recognize myself.

I have the same old shoulder-length red hair, same old green eyes, and a blue blouse and long white skirt. But my eyes are haunted, hollowed, as I know my fate now. 

How they look at me... the quick downward glances, the accusing looks, the biting of lower lips.

"Willow!" I hear Giles call. "It's time to go."

I wretch myself from the mirror. Tears push itself to my eyes, but I resist them. After all, I've been crying so much, why should I do it now?

"I'm coming," I whisper.

We were going to the Watchers' Council in England, to a trial I have to stand up for. Oh, God, I don't think I can do this...

But I must. 


End file.
